


Take a Ride

by cofax



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Episode Related, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-11-24
Updated: 2009-11-24
Packaged: 2017-10-03 15:54:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 888
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19829
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cofax/pseuds/cofax
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The lure of the open road.  Snippet for "Covenant", inspired by Elishavah.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Take a Ride

It's a spiffy little rental, and when they're clear of the city Sam takes it up to seventy on a narrow one-lane highway, heading straight east into the Central Valley.

Sam is jittery with caffeine, nervous about Alec's proof, and just a little pissed off. She's a field officer, a scientist, and leader of the point team for the most important project ever undertaken by any military in human history. These intelligence leaks are the _Pentagon's_ problem, not hers. Only here, with the cottonwood trees and farm stands whipping past and Daniel asleep against the window, can she admit the general's insistence on handling it internally annoys her. A lot.

SG-1 hasn't been offworld for *weeks*.

There's a stop sign coming up, one of those random four-way stops in the middle of nowhere, where the roads are drawn by rulers along section and township boundaries and most of the traffic is farm equipment and migrant workers following the harvest. Sam lets the Mustang coast to a stop just before the sign and lets it sit there, engine humming happily in the bright sun.

Alec's press conference is early tomorrow. She has a little time.

She puts the car into gear and lunges through the intersection, gravel spinning behind her. The acceleration jolts Daniel awake. Face bleary, he fumbles at his sunglasses for a moment before sitting up.

"This doesn't look like San Jose," he observes mildly after a moment.

"Nope," she says, and takes a sudden, skidding, right turn, so the midday sun slants across them, striping the road with shadow-sun-shadow as they race south.

She grins. Daniel's eyebrows are a little raised, but seven years on SG-1 have made him a lot less flappable. "Ookay," he says.

This car isn't going fast enough for her. Sam pushes it a little harder, and now they're doing over ninety. Pete would be upset if she drove like this with him in the car; Daniel just shrugs and accepts it.

But Sam doesn't want to think about Pete, and how he was *happy* that the mission to P3X-938 was scrubbed. Because his friend Jeff is having a barbecue this weekend and now she can go, to stand around drinking light beer with wives and girlfriends while the guys advise Jeff on the right way to grill steaks. They'll ask her what she does and she'll trot out the same tired story about deep space telemetry and then someone will mercifully change the subject to childcare or girls' softball.

"Sam?" Daniel's curious, his mouth pulled into half a smile as he looks from her face to the road to the dusty ground between the fruit trees they pass.

She flexes her hands around the steering wheel, shakes her shoulders. "Don't you just want to *go*, sometimes, Daniel?" She can't say what she needs, can't make the words right. It's all tangled up with Pete and the politics and the general and the endless paperwork, tying her down when what she needs is a wormhole, a firefight, a new horizon opening before her.

Daniel laughs, and she turns her head to see he's leaning towards her, eyes bright over the rims of his sunglasses. "Uh, peripatetic archaeologist here, Sam."

Daniel never stops *going*, does he? Earth, Abydos, Earth, ascension, Abydos, Earth again. He can't stay still any more than she can; she wonders if it's why they're so good at what they do, if they're unique. O'Neill has it too, the way he's always picking things up in the labs, turning them over, long fingers playing with tools and artifacts. But the thought of the general unsettles her: she's angry and she doesn't want to think about him either.

Sam grimaces, expands her nostrils to smell the wind. She doesn't want to think about *anything* at the moment, not Pete, not the general, not the question of whether the world's complacent ignorance is about to be blown to hell.

They've broken out of the orchards now, and the road is deep in the shade, curving now between stands of trees. Sam slows somewhat, frustrated by the reduced visibility. She glances at Daniel again: his eyes are on her, warm and pondering, the half-smile abandoned on his lips.

There's a turnout ahead, a short driveway ending in a locked gate dotted with rusted no trespassing signs. Sam downshifts fast and pulls off the road, making Daniel put a hand on the dashboard for balance. She tucks the car deep in the shadows of the trees and turns off the motor.

The engine ticks, the air smells of dust, eucalyptus, and manure. A breeze chases a dust-devil across the driveway and as she follows it with her gaze Sam meets Daniel's eyes.

She removes her sunglasses and unsnaps her seatbelt.

"Uh, Sam?"

It's awkward climbing over the gearstick in this damned skirt, and Daniel fumbles his seat belt, making her wait, suspended above him, one shoe dangling from her toe. She pulls it off and tosses it into the back before settling down on top of him.

"Daniel," she replies, finally. He still looks a little confused, but -- she wriggles a little -- he's not unhappy. She leans forward and nips at his earlobe, tugs a little on his tie.

Whispers, hot into his ear so she feels him twitch.

"Wanna go for a ride?"


End file.
